I was curious about how historical authors are treating arranged-marriage stories in recent books. Our subgenre sort of owns this trope and they are among the favorite stories with readers. Authors of contemporary romance can sometimes employ an arranged marriage, but unless the story involves a culture where such marriages are still common it is hard to make the situation ring true.

Needless to say the trope is still popular. Here are some examples from the last year (and coming spring) that feature arranged marriages.

Julia London’s new book, Wild Wicked Scot (Highland Groom Series book one), is a good example of current arranged-marriage stories. It takes place in the early 18th century, just when Scotland and England were formally united after centuries of rivalry. Cailean Mackenzie, a Scottish laird, and Margot Armstrong, an English heiress, are like their respective nations in a sense — they each have a rich history apart from one another, and when they are brought together by this arrangement, their different worlds collide — in some ways that work, but also in ways that sow distrust.

“My favorite part of the book is the early stages of their arranged marriage, when neither of them has a clue about the other,” Julia said. “Cailean is young and brash and successful, and he thinks he has this marriage thing in the bag. Margot is sheltered and naïve. She never thought she’d be living in some dank castle as far from society as one could possibly be. Cailean and Margot don’t understand each other at all, don’t particularly like each other in the beginning, and yet there is this physical chemistry between them that makes things so much more confusing.”

The inherent conflict of being bound to a stranger is one of the things that give these stories their distinctiveness. “Most romance stories end with the Happily Ever After and a marriage, but this trope starts at the point in a relationship where a book normally closes,” Elisabeth Hobbes explained. “Usual rules of courtship are abandoned and there is no wooing or flirting and gradual falling in love.”

That is true of her story The Blacksmith’s Wife, a Harlequin Historical. Even more intriguing is how she combines this trope with a “common man” hero. Hal, an illegitimate blacksmith, is offered his knight brother’s rejected sweetheart, Joanna, in order to further his prospects with her Guild Master uncle. They move from Medieval York to the North York Moors and attempt to negotiate and build a relationship neither of them wanted. Their potential happiness is threatened by secrets they are both keeping and the reappearance of Hal’s brother intent on winning back his former love.

Elisa Braden thinks the forced combination of two strangers has explosive possibilities. “Two people are bound together in an intimate partnership, willingly or unwillingly, and they either struggle against it or find themselves growing into each other, into love. It’s the ultimate expression of beauty birthed by necessity,” she said. In her story The Devil Is a Marquess (Rescued from Ruin series book four) Benedict Chatham, the new Marquess of Rutherford, must marry a fortune or risk utter ruin. Tall, redheaded disaster Charlotte Lancaster offers just such a fortune, provided he is willing to pay her father’s price: one year of fidelity and sobriety. Forced to end his libertine ways, Chatham may prove he is more than the scandalous charmer she married, but will it be enough to keep his unwanted wife?

“What I love about this story is how he changes when more is demanded of him,” she said. “He comes to understand what it means to matter to someone — a woman whose respect and love grows more addicting the longer their marriage lasts.”

Of course, the designated partners in an arranged marriage may not go quietly to the altar. One of them may try to subvert the entire process. That is what happens in Ruth Kaufman’s The Bride Tournament. King Edward IV orders Lady Eleanor de la Tour to marry Richard Courtenay, the new Earl of Glasmere. Not only does he pursue alchemy, anathema to her, she still wants to marry her now-former betrothed. She holds a bride tournament to find the earl a better, more willing, bride so everyone will be satisfied, but the more time she spends around the handsome, intriguing earl, the more she fears she’s made a mistake.

Ruth thinks the potential for characters’ dissatisfaction with the arrangement, and how they act on that, is one of the appeals for readers. The various ways in which the characters deal with the situation also gives the trope a lot of variety. “I think readers are eager to see how the hero and/or heroine handle the arranged marriage,” she said. “Will they figure out how to and learn to make the best of it, try to outwit or circumvent the authority figure(s) so they don’t have to wed the assigned person, or somehow make outright refusal acceptable? How will those choices play out? Will they feel the same way about their situation, or will one fight for it and the other against it? How will they interact with each other? And since we know romances end in an HEA, when will desire ignite, will they consummate (and if so, how does that impact their situation), and how will their feelings for each other resolve?”

One of the challenges of these stories is maintaining a sense of character control. In other words, how does an author keep the characters from appearing to simply accept the power exerted over them? Alice Coldbreath answered this question in a unique way. She had her heroine ultimately make the arrangement herself. In her book Her Bastard Bridegroom (Vawdrey Brothers book one), Lady Linnet Cadwallader has been raised a helpless invalid in her own castle. Brought up to believe she will “never make old bones” she lives a quiet and lonely existence, hiding away from a world that believes her to be hideously misshapen and ugly. Then one day bastard-born Mason Vawdrey rides up to her gates and changes her world forever.

“I had this idea of a medieval lady who sat passively in the dark at the top of a tower, Lady of Shalott style,” Alice explained. “She’s waiting for this young puppet groom to turn up and marry her in name only. Then instead of him this great hulking brute, his illegitimate brother shows up to jilt her on his brother’s behalf and not very sympathetically either! Instead of falling in a heap, this sheltered lady seizes control of her life with a shocking proposition for him to step in and take the groom’s place. I just loved the idea of this timid female facing rejection and deciding instead to negotiate an entirely different type of marriage. A marriage that throws them both of them entirely out of their comfort zones.”

Another twist on the trope can be found in The Black Knight’s Reward(Warriors of York series book two) by Marliss Melton and Sydney Jane Baily. Guilty of heresy and sorcery, Merry is sentenced to burn while the famed Black Knight, Luke, serves his king with one goal — to inherit his family’s estate. By rescuing a witch from the powerful Church, he puts his future in jeopardy! Still, Luke wants to offer her more than his sword arm, though as her dark past returns, Merry fears she cannot trust a man torn between royal duty and personal desire.

“Readers of arranged-marriage romances want to walk the path along with the characters as they discover that the flower of love can grow in the most barren of gardens,” Sydney Jane said. “In The Black Knight’s Reward, Merry’s sister arranges for her to marry Luke by demanding that her own husband threaten him into it. Marriage or death are Luke’s choices. On the heroine’s part, Merry would marry Luke in a heartbeat for the sake of the love, admiration and respect she feels for him. She is disappointed to learn that he is marrying her for any lesser reasons. Readers get to enjoy vicariously the change in Merry from doubtful to confident and in Luke from stoic resignation to absolute devotion to his wife.”

Since arranged marriages were the norm in historical times, it is not surprising that they work really well in historical romances based on real figures from history. Blythe Gifford’s forthcoming medieval romance, Rumors at Court, a Harlequin Historical (Royal Wedding Stories book three, coming April 18 in print and May 1 in e-book), tells the story of widow Valerie of Florham who wants nothing more than to forget her abusive marriage and live peacefully at the mercy of no man. But she is forced to wed Sir Gil Wolford, a man who has spent his life trying to escape the rumors of his family’s past. Once wed, each discovers that marriage, and the marriage bed, are altogether different than either had ever expected.

Blythe finds the arranged-marriage trope useful to authors and among the kinds of stories readers want. “For historical writers, it allows you to get the characters in bed in a time frame much closer to that of our modern times! And that means you can use their sexual journey as part of the path to their happily ever after, which is a journey that modern readers can better understand and appreciate. (Sort of the flip side of the above.) It also gives you a built-in way to keep them together.”

She also sees another way in which these stories speak to modern readers. “While arranged marriages are not something (most) modern readers are ever likely to face, the setup can, in some ways, more closely parallel their own experience. By which I mean, sometimes, these days, you end up in bed with someone you don’t necessarily love. So the awkwardness, the wondering whether I can really be happy with this person I am sleeping with, that has some modern parallels.”

Julia thinks the discovery of love and the slow burn of these stories are among the things that appeal to readers and writers. “As a writer, the fun part of the book was exploring how two inexperienced people, from different backgrounds, with vastly different expectations, would navigate the start of an arranged marriage, particularly when they discover that sizzling sexual chemistry. It’s great fun to explore the conundrum of when the heart wants what the brain rejects — how can you despise someone and yet yearn for them at the same time? For the writer, there are all sorts of possibilities for conflicts and steamy resolutions.”

She agrees with Blythe that although in contemporary Western culture we do not have arranged marriages, that readers relate to these stories. “For women in particular, I think it’s the appeal of the Impossible Situation. You want to know how the heroine is going to either escape or deal with marriage to a virtual stranger, from which there is no escape hatch, as a divorce was extremely difficult for a woman to obtain. I think a lot of modern women who married for love have, at some point, fleetingly contemplated walking out the door. But imagine if you didn’t marry for love and, in fact, didn’t really want to marry at all but was browbeat into it by an over-reaching father? It’s the ultimate, walk-a-mile-in-these-shoes experience, because all of us can relate.”

Alice thinks both writers and readers enjoy the inherent tension in these stories. “You have an anticipation that builds and builds waiting for them to forge a bond together. They are constantly ‘rubbing up’ against each other, sparks flying, conversation flowing. It’s exciting watching their relationship develop and blossom.”

Elisa points out that the underlying dynamics are not limited to romance or love stories, and that those dynamics are very popular. “This concept exists in other genres, minus the sexual component. Think The Odd Couple or Lethal Weapon or Midnight Run. Whether it’s mismatched roommates, partnered detectives or a bounty hunter and a mob accountant, forcing unexpected pairings into close quarters fundamentally hardwires the story with tension. Adding the element of romance is like piling gunpowder beneath showering sparks. The reader can’t help wondering how the relationship will weather the inevitable explosion.”

Sydney Jane noted that this trope is not without its dangers for writers. “There has to be a believable reason for the arrangement and, for conflict’s sake, a solid reason why it might not be in both parties best interest.”

Elisabeth Hobbes added another point to that one. “There is a fine line between arranged and forced, so creating characters who still have agency is a challenge.”

On the other hand, as Blythe mentioned, an arranged marriage provides a very plausible and historically accurate way to have scenes of intimacy very early in the story — scenes that can then map the relationship as it develops. There is possibly no other trope designed so perfectly to employ sensuality as a symbol of character development, thematic development, and as a plot device.

Ruth sums up the enduring appeal of arranged-marriage stories. “There are so many variations on the theme, from medievals like mine where the king could command his subjects to wed, to time periods and settings where parents were often expected to arrange marriages, to mail-order brides, where both parties agree to an arranged marriage but don’t quite know what they’re going to get. Writers enjoy giving familiar tropes like this a new spin or turning them completely upside down. This challenges both authors’ imaginations and readers’ expectations and keeps these stories fresh.”

Madeline Hunter is the USA TODAY and New York Times bestselling author of 29 historical romances. She has been nominated seven times for the RITA award and won twice. Her next novel is The Most Dangerous Duke in London, coming May 30. You can learn more about her and her books at www.MadelineHunter.com.